Scripture and the Church

This morning, I listened to a very long talk about the "necessity" of Catholic laity personally reading Sacred Scripture. Let's be clear: personally reading Sacred Scripture is not necessary for our salvation. The Church has never taught that. Instead, proper belief and participation in the Sacraments are necessary for our salvation. That is a beautiful gift from God because if reading scripture was necessary for salvation, the first 1,650 years of Christianity would have been all for naught for many of the lay faithful!

Anyway, there is a benefit to reading Sacred Scripture. That is the same benefit we derive from every sacramental and every prayer - the gift of grace. In terms of our salvation, we want to obtain the grace to die a happy death, in the State of Grace. We want to merit the gift of final perseverance. The way to do so is to imitate our Blessed Lord. And, in order to do that, we must know Him in an intimate and personal way.

That does not mean that we are awaiting private revelation in Scripture. In fact, we believe the opposite and strive to avoid the temptation to see Scripture that way. As the Tridentine Creed says:

I also admit the Holy Scripture according to that sense which our Holy Mother the Church has held, and does hold, to which it belongs to judge of the true sense and interpretations of the Scriptures. Neither will I ever take and interpret them otherwise than according to the unanimous consent of the Fathers.

So, far from trying to obtain some gnostic idea of Christ, when Catholics read Sacred Scripture, we do so in an attempt to know Christ as the Church knows Him. This is not about secret knowledge or answers to life questions: it is about meditating on the Life of our Blessed Lord and those around Him, particularly His Blessed Mother. It is about becoming part of the Holy Family. Why? Because children are able to imitate their parents and relatives much better than they are able to imitate strangers.

Think About This...

"I would like to give you just one example of what the Council was: We did everything possible so that Vatican Council II would condemn Communism. Being a pastoral council (we must remember that Vatican II was a pastoral council), that is to say, a council which has as its principal preoccupation the salvation of souls, which has as its object the destruction of the errors that menace souls, it was necessary, without doubt that this Council should be opposed to the greatest danger presenting itself in this age, as is Communism—a danger which extends itself throughout the world. This Council, where 2,500 bishops responsible for the Catholic Church were meeting was not capable of formally condemning Communism."

- Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, 1982

How to Dance Goth

In keeping with the "Goth" in the title of this blog, I present this video.

Never having been to  a Goth club, I can't vouch for its accuracy, but it's good for a laugh, anyway.

By the way . . . in Hell, Catholics will sing and Baptists will dance. :-)

Have you heard of Casti Connubii?

We've all heard of Humanae Vitae, but how many of us know the history of the Church's teaching on birth control? How many of us know, for instance, that Pope Pius XI wrote a much longer, more detailed encyclical on Christian marriage and morality called Casti Connubii in 1930? You can read that encyclical here.

What you'll find as you read this encyclical, which is part of the ordinary magesterium of the Catholic Church is that the Holy Father Pope Pius XI not only condemns emerging immoral behaviour outside of marriage, but he discusses the nature of chastity amongst married people. Note that, contrary to the current idea that the unitive and procreative aspects of marriage are on equal footing, the teaching is that the procreative aspect is the primary aspect, while the unitive aspect is the secondary aspect. The teaching is that marriage is for the propagation of the species, while the unitive life of the spouses is a secondary aspect. Perhaps it is this shift in focus on marriage that opened the door to the perversions and mockeries of marriage in the 21st Century.

I will summarize with some extended quotes from this encyclical:

"Since, therefore, the conjugal act is destined primarily by nature for the begetting of children, those who in exercising it deliberately frustrate its natural power and purpose sin against nature and commit a deed which is shameful and intrinsically vicious."

"Since, therefore, openly departing from the uninterrupted Christian tradition some recently have judged it possible solemnly to declare another doctrine regarding this question, the Catholic Church, to whom God has entrusted the defense of the integrity and purity of morals, standing erect in the midst of the moral ruin which surrounds her, in order that she may preserve the chastity of the nuptial union from being defiled by this foul stain, raises her voice in token of her divine ambassadorship and through Our mouth proclaims anew: any use whatsoever of matrimony exercised in such a way that the act is deliberately frustrated in its natural power to generate life is an offense against the law of God and of nature, and those who indulge in such are branded with the guilt of a grave sin."

"No difficulty can arise that justifies the putting aside of the law of God which forbids all acts intrinsically evil. There is no possible circumstance in which husband and wife cannot, strengthened by the grace of God, fulfill faithfully their duties and preserve in wedlock their chastity unspotted. This truth of Christian Faith is expressed by the teaching of the Council of Trent. 'Let no one be so rash as to assert that which the Fathers of the Council have placed under anathema, namely, that there are precepts of God impossible for the just to observe. God does not ask the impossible, but by His commands, instructs you to do what you are able, to pray for what you are not able that He may help you.'"

"Nor are those considered as acting against nature who in the married state use their right in the proper manner although on account of natural reasons either of time or of certain defects, new life cannot be brought forth. For in matrimony as well as in the use of the matrimonial rights there are also secondary ends, such as mutual aid, the cultivating of mutual love, and the quieting of concupiscence which husband and wife are not forbidden to consider so long as they are subordinated to the primary end and so long as the intrinsic nature of the act is preserved. "

He goes one to condemn abortion in the subsequent paragraphs, for these issues have always been closely linked: "Those who hold the reins of government should not forget that it is the duty of public authority by appropriate laws and sanctions to defend the lives of the innocent, and this all the more so since those whose lives are endangered and assailed cannot defend themselves. Among whom we must mention in the first place infants hidden in the mother's womb. And if the public magistrates not only do not defend them, but by their laws and ordinances betray them to death at the hands of doctors or of others, let them remember that God is the Judge and Avenger of innocent blood which cried from earth to Heaven."

I suggest you read this encyclical.

Free Exercise 101

As a Catholic who happens to be a legal scholar, I believe (and argue) that the HHS rule and subsequent so-called “compromise” violate Catholics’ free exercise rights and possibly their free speech rights as well. As a legal scholar who happens to be Catholic, I’m attempting to understand the precedents and legal arguments to the contrary.

            First Amendment law and history are way too complicated for me to give a complete background here, even were I so inclined and even if I had the time (which I do not). But here is a sketch of some interesting ideas and cases related to free exercise.

            The first thing to note is the text of the First Amendment’s religion clauses: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof.” Both the concepts and the wording are based on the Founders’ study of history, including sources ranging from Calvin to the Antifederalists, as you can see here. But for our purpose, note that textually we’re talking not about “freedom of worship” (which, like “separation of church and state” is a left-wing mantra that isn’t a part of the Constitution) but “free exercise” of “religion”—rather broader than mere worship, wouldn’t you agree?

            Justice William J. Brennan thought so, and his civil libertarian credentials are unimpeachable. In Sherbert v. Verner (1963), Adell Sherbert’s employer tried to make her work on Saturday. Problem: Sherbert was a Seventh-Day Adventist who couldn’t do that without violating her conscience. Her employer fired her and she sought unemployment compensation, but the state denied it and she sued. The Supremes held 7-2 that the denial violated her free exercise rights. Here’s what Brennan said: “To condition the availability of benefits upon this appellant's willingness to violate a cardinal principle of her religious faith effectively penalizes the free exercise of her constitutional liberties.”

            “So what’s the problem?” you ask. There, Sherbert had a choice: violate her conscience or forego unemployment. Here, Catholics have no choice: the rule forces us to violate our consciences. A fortiori, if Sherbert won, shouldn’t we?

            Ahh, not so fast. That more conservative Rehnquist court, which liberals loved decrying, greatly restricted the Sherbert rule in Employment Division v. Smith (1990). In that case, Alfred Smith wanted to use peyote—and had used it—as part of his religious practices, since he was a member of the Native American Church. The Indian peoples have been using peyote for religious purposes since long before Columbus ever showed up, but hey, now the white man is in charge, and he’s said that peyote use is a crime. So, like any good, red-blooded—er, red-skinned—American citizen, Smith sued.

            In the Supreme Court, that horrible Justice Scalia, whom liberals love to hate, delivered an opinion that they currently love (ideology, like politics, makes for strange bedfellows). In siding with Oregon against Smith, he wrote the following:

We have never held that an individual's religious beliefs excuse him from compliance with an otherwise valid law prohibiting conduct that the State is free to regulate. … As described succinctly by Justice Frankfurter in Minersville School Dist. Bd. of Ed. v. Gobitis, 310 U.S. 586, 594 -595 (1940): "Conscientious scruples have not, in the course of the long struggle for religious toleration, relieved the individual from obedience to a general law not aimed at the promotion or restriction of religious beliefs. The mere possession of religious convictions which contradict the relevant concerns of a political society does not relieve the citizen from the discharge of political responsibilities (footnote omitted)." … Subsequent decisions have consistently held that the right of free exercise does not relieve an individual of the obligation to comply with a "valid and neutral law of general applicability on the ground that the law proscribes (or prescribes) conduct that his religion prescribes (or proscribes)."

            My friends, this is just exactly what the Left and the Obama administration what to hear right now. The problem? First, the person who said it was Scalia, one of their great demons. Second, he relied heavily—as you can see—on Gobitis, which is a case that the Supremes had overruled almost a half-century earlier! (It was a case in which Jehovah’s Witnesses were forced by the government to salute the American flag in violation of their consciences.) Can you say “hypocritical?” Nevertheless, the Smith case is still good law, subject to an important exception.

            That exception is RFRA, i.e., the Religious Freedom Restoration Act, by which Congress attempted in 1993 to overturn Smith and restore the Sherbert rule. The Supremes shot down this effort—to a degree—in City of Boerne v. Flores (1997). But here’s the kicker: the Court’s invalidation of RFRA only extended to situations in which RFRA applied to state actions. (In legalese, Congress can enforce federal constitutional provisions against the states when those provisions are incorporated into the Fourteenth Amendment, but Congress can’t expand or redefine those provisions.) But in the 2006 case of Gonzales v. O Centro Espirita Beneficente Uniao do Vegetal—another case of liturgical hallucinogenic use, like Smith—the Court revealed that RFRA is still good law vis-à-vis federal laws, such as Obamacare. In the Gonzales case, the Supremes allowed the use of hallucinogenic tea, since RFRA had effectively overruled the Smith rationale and restored the Sherbert rule. Thus, it appears that the Sherbert rule still applies in the HHS case. Of course, Gonzales dealt with “worship,” and the Court may find a similarly narrow exclusion in the HHS rule case, which would be bad news for the Church. But the good news is that Sherbert itself clearly wasn’t about “worship,” so if RFRA really has restored the Sherbert rule, then the Church should win. And the only way HHS can win is by conceding liberal hypocrisy in relying on a Scalia opinion that relies on an overruled case that coerced conformity (i.e., forced dissenters to salute the American flag—the same flag that liberals like to burn.)

            So there you have it. While the law can be made to say anything, as the Critical Legal Studies lefties noted, if we look at it in principled terms, Obama and HHS should lose.

Appeasement, Part II

     The furor over Fr. Marcel Guarnizo's denial of communion to lesbian Barbara Johnson is, as one might have expected, devolving into a "she said/he said" match. Among other things, that link reports that "A lifelong Catholic and former Catholic school teacher, Barbara says she hadn’t even considered that her sexual orientation would be a problem with Father Marcel until she stepped forward to take communion." If true, then its either willful ignorance on her part or gross negligence on the part of all of her priests and lay catechists for her entire life.
     On the other hand, several sources are reporting that someone who claims to have been there gives a different version:

"just wanted to let you know that there is a lot more to this story than has been published। I was in a meeting with Fr Marcel and heard the whole story। The woman in question brought her lesbian partner into the vesting sacristy just before the funeral Mass and made sure to introduce her partner to Fr Marcel, introducing her as her ‘lover’. He told her then that she should not present herself for Communion."

    Maybe. Maybe not. But while all of this is necessary to consider in order to avoid buying into the mainstream, anti-Catholic culture's portrayal of the event, in the end it doesn't change my earlier analysis. No matter how well the Church and her leaders and members conduct themselves, there will always be troublemakers. Even if Barbara Johnson was here acting in (for lack of a better term) good faith, there will be others who will deliberately try to set the Church up. It goes back to Nero, who claimed that the Christians were the ones who set fire to Rome. The real question is how the Church deals with it.
    Whether or not Johnson was trying to set the Church up in this case is irrelevant. The Church has been setting itself up for this for a long time. As was the case with the sex abuse scandal, the truly distressing thing was not the behavior of the priest. In the sex abuse business, priests acted immorally and criminally, but that's going to happen with a certain number of school teachers, Protestant ministers, and college football coaches. It's tragic, but it's going to happen. The bishops' response was to ignore the priests' behavior, cover it up, and enable them to continue their predations, and therein lies the true horror of the sex abuse scandal.
    Here, unlike the sex abuse cases, the priest seems to have acted correctly within his understanding of Catholic doctrines and canon law. But this time the bishops took action immediately; they threw him under the bus. And just as their inaction was wrong in the sex abuse crisis, their action was wrong in the case of  Fr. Guarnizo.
    The church has consistently taught the disordered nature homosexual behavior, as may be seen in sources ranging from the Bible to paragraphs 2357-59 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church. At no point has Johnson attempted to deny her lesbian relationship: in fact, she appears to be trumpeting it. So what does Cardinal Weurl do? Rather than calling her to conversion, he apologizes to her, throws Fr.  Guarnizo under the bus, and "said he did not believe in denying Communion because it is impossible to know what is in another person’s heart." (This in addition to dissing the concept of the Requiem Mass as a time to pray for the deceased and instead canonize her--excuse me, celebrate her life.) So all the priests and bishops throughout history who have denied people communion, excommunicated them, and placed them under an interdict were wrong, Your Eminence? Were St. Thomas Becket's excommunications wrong?  Was Archbishop Joseph Rummell wrong to deny communion to segregationist civic leaders in Louisiana in 1962? Your Eminence, do you claim to be more Catholic than the Catholic Church? Talk about clericalism . . . .
     Once again, I will state that had the leaders of AmChurch been doing their jobs for the last half-century, this episode never would have occurred--or if it had, it would clearly have been a case of intended Catholic-baiting, to which the Church could respond with consistency and solidarity. But not only have the bishops militantly refused to teach and defend the faith; they now, once again, in this episode, capitulate and pander to the forces of secularism and anti-Catholicism. How, I wonder, will God judge them for what they have done to His Church?

Pope Paul VI: An Example of Papal Infallibility

Yes, you read that title correctly: A Catholic Traditionalist is now going to make the claim that Pope Paul VI, whom many consider to be second only to Msgr. Annibale Bugnini in terms of the damage done to Tradition, is an example that should give us greater faith in the doctrine of Papal Infallibility as set forth in the First Vatican Council.

As I mentioned in my previous post, the Pope speaks infallibly when proclaiming a dogma ex cathedra or when teaching on faith or morals in accordance with the Magesterium of the Church. When teaching personally or not in accordance with the Magesterium, the Pope in not infallible. So, why is Pope Paul VI such a great example in this regard?

Pope Paul VI's pontificate can be summed up by reference to two "proclamations". The first and most remembered is his "approval" of the Second Vatican Council, which he expressly said was "pastoral in nature" and did not make any statements endowed with "infallibility". You'll remember from an earlier post that a Church Council is made ecumenical and approved by the Pope's approval of it. Therefore, this is a very important statement from the late Pontiff as it gives us the guidelines we need to understand the place of the Second Vatican Council: it is an aberration, not necessarily in its teaching, but in being the first and only "pastoral" council, as well as the first and only council to not address a particular error and define doctrine in response to it.

While I'm on this topic, let's take a brief detour and consider what Vatican II could have been as a doctrinal Ecumenical Council... The Council was convoked in the middle of the 20th Century in the midst of the Cold War and the worldwide fear of the spread of Communism (in the wake of the destruction of Fascism) and in the midst of the Nuclear Age and the fears that that engendered. So, what could the Council have discussed? Certainly, the Fathers of the Council could have reiterated the intrinsic evil that is Communism. They could have discussed a world moving from fascism to democracy, which brings its own troubles amongst peoples. They could have discussed war in the nuclear age and man's response to this great problem. Perhaps, they could have reached back and discussed genocide, another intrinsic evil. Yet, they discussed none of these things in great detail -- favoring instead things that really don't seem to matter much, like "modernity", which really means nothing as every age is certainly more "modern" than the last!

That's enough digression. Suffice it say, Pope Paul VI presided over much of and approved a "pastoral" council that has ultimately caused great damage to the Church and, in many cases, has scandalized the faithful by introducing what appear to be novel ideas in the areas of ecumenism and religious tolerance. On the other hand, he has saved us from the problem of perceived "changing" doctrine by noting that the Council did not proclaim any infallible doctrine. Therefore, where the Council appears to contradict the prior Ordinary Magesterium on these points, we need not be unsettled -- we simply need believe what the Church has always taught (that is, we can basically gloss over the things stated in the Second Vatican Council on these points). It is noteworthy, though, that the other portions of the Council that discuss matters that have always been held true are actually infallible because they comport with the existing Magesterial teaching.

So, the answer to the question: Is Vatican II infallible? is "Yes! On the whole, it certainly is!" What is remarkable about that? Well, the historical evidence is quite strong that the Council was hijacked by a small, but vocal, contingent of Modernists and Communists/Socialists! It is a remarkable assurance for us that, despite the "smoke of satan" entering into the Council, the "teachings" actually exhibit very little error! Now, the errors present are certainly painful and important, but then we have Pope Paul VI telling us directly that those errors are not infallible! What a remarkable assurance that God is protecting his Church from the Gates of Hell!

This brings me to the second remarkable thing about Pope Paul VI's pontificate: Humanae Vitae. The same Pope who presided over and approved a Council that has thrown the Church into disarray for 50 years wrote the single greatest and most important encyclical in the last 50 years! It perfectly distills Magesterial teaching and is incredibly prophetic. Again, what a remarkable assurance that God is protecting his Holy Church!

We are right now seeing the fruit of Pope Paul VI's pontificate: the Second Vatican Council's experiment with "religious liberty" is bearing fruit and we are experiencing the logical result of this experiment in the realm of contraception, which Pope Paul VI so clearly and expertly condemned. The late Holy Father has provided the answer to our quandry in both regards: we must look to the Magesterium of the Church for answers about religious tolerance and the clear teaching of Humanae Vitae. Contraception is to be condemned, as well as the "religious liberty" that allows governments to promote false doctrines contrary to the Holy Church of God, which is the Roman Catholic Church.

The fact that Pope Paul VI, whose pontificate took place during (but did not cause!) a very turbulent time in Church history (the same in which we live, to be certain), did not proclaim any false doctrine even though the world and others in the Church certainly pressed upon him to do so is a great miracle -- a miracle that continues today -- the miracle of Papal Infallibility.

Papal Infallibility

After discussing the authority of the Roman Pontiff in my previous post, I now turn to the idea of Papal Infallibility. Like the issue of authority, the history of the early Church supports the idea of the infallibility of the Vicar of Christ. It is clear that the early councils, in order to be seen as valid and ecumenical, were required to be "approved" by the Holy See. That is, no matter how many bishops got together, the Pope always had the authority to approve or disapprove the particular canons drawn up by the bishops. This exercise of authority includes with it an infallible element - why else turn the matter over to the Holy Father for approval if his approval included as much assurance of accuracy as the Patriarch of any other area?

Without going too deeply over the history of the infallibility of the Roman Pontiff, I want to turn to the types of infallible teachings which the Holy Father may promulgate. This is the particular area where many are confused - particularly Catholic priests, bishops, and laity. Many consider every action and statement of the Pope to be sealed with an infallible character. This is simply not true and the Church has never proposed such a thing for our belief. This is quite important also as it appears that some Popes have going astray from the true faith in some instances (but importantly, they did so personally and incredibly never taught the heresy which they are claimed to have embraced). So then, what is the mark of infallibility and how is it guaranteed?

The Infallibility of the Roman Pontiff

The particulars of this doctrine were only particularly and specifically defined at the First Vatican Council in the late 19th Century. However, as Vatican I states, the Church has always believed this doctrine, as evidenced by the early ecumenical councils, such as Constantinople, Florence, and Lyon (the last two of which were called in an attempt to end the schism between East and West by defining what the Church believed about the infallibility of the Pope).

The mark of infallibility for the Pope is always limited to faith, morals, and Church disciplinary issues (as defined in the First Vatican Council's canon on the authority of the Holy Father). Bear this fact in mind as we review the levels of papal teaching below.

The Church teaches that there are three levels of papal teaching. Each will be treated in turn below.

The First Level of Papal Teaching - Ex Cathedra

The First Vatican Council anathematizes anyone who does not believe the following:

"[W]hen the Roman pontiff speaks EX CATHEDRA, that is, when, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole church, he possesses, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, that infallibility which the divine Redeemer willed his church to enjoy in defining doctrine concerning faith or morals. Therefore, such definitions of the Roman pontiff are of themselves, and not by the consent of the church, irreformable."

This is the most straightforward of the three levels to be discussed. When the Pope makes an ex cathedra statement, he does so formally. This is also the most rare and has only been exercised in very limited circumstances, such as the proclamation of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. As stated above, when the Pope exercises his authority to teach ex cathedra, all must submit to his teaching and believe what he proclaims else they are anathema. Because this infallible teaching is so rarely employed and so straightforward, it requires little discussion.

The Second Level of Papal Teaching - The Ordinary Magesterium

At the outset, please understand that we are speaking here only of the Magesterium of the papacy. However, please note that councils, synods, bishops, and priests also form part of the ordinary magesterium. This is the Deposit of Faith - that is, this is the Tradition of the Church. It is important for our purposes to understand that the teachings that have always been accepted and taught form the ordinary magesterium proper. As we will see, the pope's second level of infallibility is subject to the Deposit of Faith as it has always been accepted and taught.

The Ordinary Magesterium of the Roman Pontiff includes Papal writings, such as encyclicals and exhortations, and audiences. Infallibility does cover the ordinary magesterium of the Roman Pontiff. That is, the pope's writings and audiences are infallible (when he is teaching on faith or morals) when certain conditions are met and when those conditions are met, the people must submit to the teaching (with a true act of faith) as no one can deny what has been revealed by God. When the conditions for infallibility are not met, people must still respect the teaching, but are not bound to believe it under pain of anathema.

So, what constitutes an exercise of the ordinary magesterium of the Roman Pontiff wherein we must make an act of faith in that teaching? Basically, any time the Pope teaches something that has already been accepted and taught, this is an infallible teaching. He need not use any "magic words" to invoke his infallibility. For example, the famous encyclical Humane Vitae was not an ex cathedra statement of the Church's teaching regarding birth control. It was a restatement of the ordinary magesterium of the Church - the Pope did not teach this anew, but stated what has already been taught. View it this way: The infallibility does not flow from the fact that the Pope is writing it, but from the fact that it is part of the Deposit of Faith. In the same way, if Pope Paul VI had stated that birth control was allowable, despite being written by a Pope, this would not be an infallible statement because it incorrectly states the teaching of the Church!

Therefore, we can see that, when the Pope teaches that which has always been taught, we must assent to that teaching with a true act of faith. When the Pope teaches anything else, we must respect the teaching unless it is harmful or leads to sin.

The Third Level of Papal Teaching - The Non-Infallible Papal Teaching

The third level of teaching, the non-infallible teaching, is actually that which is set out above. When the pope engages in teaching that is not ex cathedra and not in accord with the existing ordinary magesterium, the teaching is not infallible. The Pope can simply express his views on this or that particular subject (as our current Holy Father has done in his books on the life of Christ).

Conclusion

We must understand the Ordinary Magesterium of the Church as being separate from the non-infallible teachings else we may fall into error. We must believe that which has always been taught and throw out innovation that does not comport with the Deposit of Faith.

We are subject to the office of the Papacy (Vatican I, Session 4, Chapter 3). We owe filial affection and support to our Holy Father, the Pope of Rome, and we are not in a place to judge him, including his actions or his teachings. He has the care of the Church to consider whereas we have only our own souls and the souls of those entrusted to our care.

In our devotion to the Holy Father and the Church, though, we must also have affection and devotion to previous Popes and the unchanging teaching of the Magesterium, which is infallible and must be believed.

Appeasement

Southern Orders today has a couple of stories concerning a woman who apparently openly discussed her lesbian relationship at her mother’s funeral Mass and was consequently denied Communion by the priest. You can read about it there, or here.

A famous saying in legal circles, originally penned by jurists Baron Cranworth and Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., is "Hard cases make bad law." In essence, this means that when the law and the facts, or equities, of a case are very strongly opposed, the resulting judgments and precedents aren’t going to be satisfactory, and can ultimately call into question the soundness and validity of the judicial system. The original quotation from Baron Cranworth, in the 1842 case of Winterbottom v. Wright, reads as follows: “This is one of those unfortunate cases...in which, it is, no doubt, a hardship upon the plaintiff to be without a remedy but by that consideration we ought not to be influenced. Hard cases, it has frequently been observed, are apt to introduce bad law.” In 1904, Holmes echoed it in Northern Securities vs. United States: “Great cases like hard cases make bad law. For great cases are called great, not by reason of their importance ... but because of some accident of immediate overwhelming interest which appeals to the feelings and distorts the judgment.”

What happened with Barbara Johnson is most definitely a hard case. On the one hand, we have Canon 915, which reads: “Those upon whom the penalty of excommunication or interdict has been imposed or declared, and others who obstinately persist in manifest grave sin, are not to be admitted to holy communion.” There is no wiggle room here, and no exceptions allowed. Unfortunately, American clergy, by and large, simply refuse to abide by it; i.e., they deliberately refuse to do their duty to safeguard the sacrament from profanation and to safeguard the souls of those who receive Communion unworthily (thus engaging in false charity).

On the other hand we have a woman who is attending her mother’s funeral, for Pete’s sake. Picking a fight with her at this point has all the appearance of, and probably is actually, kicking her when she’s down.

So did the priest pick a fight? According to her, he said “I can’t give you Communion because you live with a woman, and in the eyes of the church, that is a sin.” If that’s in fact what he said, it seems a lot more explanation than necessary in a Communion line; perhaps she glossed the statement a bit to put him more in the wrong?

On the other hand, perhaps she was the one who picked a fight. What exactly did she say in her eulogy, and why did she say it? Was her comment about her relationship happenstance, or was it the deliberate casting down of a gauntlet?

In the end, I have to blame the Church for this. Not necessarily the priest, since as I wrote above, we don’t know the whole story—but the Church. Here’s why.

1) First and foremost, the aforementioned persistent, obstinate refusal for at least fifty years on the part of most clergy in most circumstances to enforce Canon 915, even in egregious cases of high-profile pro-abort “Catholic” politicians. The canon is very clear. It is, furthermore, presumably not punitive but corrective, as is excommunication. Yet, in a sense of false charity, out of a fear of hurting peoples’ feelings (and reducing revenues?), clergy just don’t deny people Communion. This leads people, in the long run, a) to believe they may receive Communion as a matter of right, b) to believe that no conditions must be met in order for them to receive Communion, and c) to believe that Catholic moral theology is irrelevant to the Catholic sacramental life, among other things. This scandalizes the faith and makes observant Catholics wonder why they even go to the trouble of trying to live according to Church precepts if the Church is going to teach indifferentism by example and hand out Communion like candy.

2) Second, the mischaracterizationof the Requiem Mass, by a bishop, as a “celebration of life” of the deceased. The purpose of a requiem Mass is to pray for the soul of the deceased, who even at that moment may be undergoing the painful fires of Purgatory. Do we really think so much of ourselves and our merits and our cooperation with grace in our lives that we can just go straight to heaven? Well yes, if we’re certain flavors of Protestant. But news flash: the Catholic Church doesn’t teach that. By celebrating this woman’s life, the Church deprived her of some intercessory prayers that may have been much needed. Where’s the charity in that?

3) Third, an overall pattern of the Church—once again, in the name of false charity and sparing feelings—refusing to judge peoples’ actions. (Nobody can judge the state of someone’s soul except God. But really, are we not to judge the actions of a Ted Bundy or an Adolph Hitler as evil? Really?) In fact—speaking of Hitler—from the Kumbaya years to today (actually, many bishops and priests are still in the Kumbaya age), the Church has embraced appeasement. Let the dissenters have what they want and maybe we’ll avoid internecine war. (And one of the things that dissenters wanted, and got, was the utter destruction, the laying waste, of Catholic catechesis for two generations, thus allowing the breeding of congregations full of people who have adopted modernist ways of thought, becoming silent majority allies of the dissenter-heretics because they don’t know any better.) But the dissenters, like Hitler, never stopped. They’ve won a big battle this week in the Johnson episode.

This third problem is actually the worst. If the Allies had opposed Hitler earlier—at the Rhineland in 1936, or even as late as the Sudetenland in 1938—he could have been defeated, even deposed, with ease. Instead, the Allies waited until the very late to fight him, and in a situation in which there were handicapped (Eastern Europe, with a Polish army ill-equipped to fight the Wehrmacht).

            Likewise, Catholic leaders in America today, in their naiveté, are learning that from the moment that they chose appeasement—chose not to teach the faith and to hold people to it—they ensured that a Poland crisis would someday occur. Today, with the HHS rule and the Johnson Communion-denying debacle, the crisis is upon is. If the Church had done its job properly, an episode like Ms. Johnson’s would never have occurred in the first place.

As a result of this Poland Crisis, the Church will not only be portrayed by the media and a hostile secular culture as being composed of bigots, but composed of hypocritical, perverted bigots. (I bet none of those “pedophile priests” were ever denied Communion, now, were they?) This will undermine whatever moral force the bishops may be able to marshal for the HHS battle—a battle that they already appeared to be weakening on before the Johnson episode. And even in this Communion uproar, the bishop’s letter shows that he caved (by stating that the priest was wrong, Canon 915 is wrong, and the characterization of a funeral Mass as a requiem is wrong). So what else is wrong, Your Excellency? Transubstantiation? The Incarnation? The existence of God? Where, pray tell, does it stop?

Folks, anyone may receive Communion in a Catholic Church. Anyone in the world. All you have to do to qualify is to choose to be Catholic and to try your best to live a Catholic life (which includes things such as regular Confession). It’s up to each individual whether or not to do that. As has been said over and over and over again, the Church doesn’t excommunicate people; people excommunicate themselves. What I’m sick of is bishops and priests apologizing to someone for his (or in this case her) decision not to qualify. As I continue to behold Church leaders in America refusing to teach or to defend the faith, I’m beginning, more and more, to ponder Luke 7:19: “And John [the Baptist] called to him two of his disciples, and sent them to Jesus, saying: Art thou he that art to come; or look we for another?”

            What’s it going to take?